Set Temperature

Steve stands positioned on the storage shed’s slab preparing to sweep Skidrow. Early in the morning, the sun preheats the streets as an oven until the set temperature is reached. There’s one in the oven. The production of love began before the industry. The ministry of sweep is a repeated and forcible action: the dirty side of mercy. Sharp jagged bars high on the perimeter wall say: keep out. Whereas the Quickie yellow scooper handle shadows say: go in, to do works in Dickies and dry fit athletic wear. Everything from the inside is brought outside. They fit inside one another like gloves: stackable and scaleable. The scales are on. The scales are off. Shed the scales. A trunk full of sanitation products organized in plastic containers gears up the preparations similar to engineering feats: latex gloves, face masks, and florescent safety vests. By leaning it forward, he’s about to bring out a large blue trash bin with a camouflage military backpack tethered by matching ratchet straps.

The assortment of pockets is what drew him to buy the bag online. Like basketball netting, a small mesh net carries a speaker of praise and worship: Gospel, Elvis Presley and contemporary. The heart of Jehoshaphat dangles in the trap. Substance over snap chat. Selfless in remembrance of Me: breads and a wine vat. A golf club for protection and a hammer for rats. At the head of the army, the distinct playlist declares the splendor of the Lord’s holiness, to the feeble squeezed between the districts: flower, fashion and finance. Towers and tents fight over temporary housing. Be respectful of their front lawn if you pass by, if not in your face. Putrid smell of human waste. It lingers. Fragrant grace is sprayed to kill the spread of disease as others have fingers in pockets. They take aim and point. As towers and tents converge, everyone is trying to make it through. Have faith in him and he will uphold you. Give thanks to the Lord, for his love endures forever. An aerospace mindset has equipped Steve’s team with innovative solutions for the mission. Extra precautions and care have been ridiculed for those who do not know his harrowing story, by staying safe with their narrowing narrative. Thick Vietnamese skin sheds their comments like a vet.

Removing piles of trash and dirty debris, gathering large discarded cardboard boxes is merely the first corner. On Fifth and Crocker residential pop-ups line the blind building’s right angles. Streams of living roamers wander up and down one ways, never ceasing: some sign-in and others sign off. As the redevelopment of downtown Los Angeles recaptures territory district by district flowers are placed on the homeless memorials. Finances are wrecked. Their fashion is more with less. The developers on either side of the passed around envelopes cannot wait long enough until it’s their perfect live work space. Layout the magazine life achieved not knowing they’re too spreading some sort of disease. Whether you’re living in Skid Row or around Skid Row the revelation is, “For you say, I am rich, I have prospered, and I need nothing, not realizing that you are wretched, pitiable, poor, blind, and naked.”

In Vietnam, Steve grew up near the southern banks of the Hau River in Cân Thó. Floating markets abound along tropical treasure troves of the Mekong Delta. Blues. Yellows. Greens. Pink. During the day as a gifted student, Steve was quickly drafted into school programs focused on teaching the Communistic way. The Communists wanted to get a hold of him early to indoctrinate Communism with full immersion. The belief system changed when he returned home from school to be with his family. He was one of the few students who had the majority of his family fight for the South Vietnamese Army with the Armed Forces of the United States of America. Discussions over traditional Vietnamese dinner would inform Steve, “It’s not like the way it is in school.” His family did not dare tell him anything else for fear of spreading the volatile speech. The ubiquitous informers would pounce on the whole family if they had morsels of intellectual evidence. Simultaneously, Steve entertained two opposing views waring over the soul of Vietnam. He could hang with his family, but he knew something they did not.

A short time after the first great wave of Vietnamese fled their homeland, Anh Dung (meaning strength and heroism), Steve’s father, Anh Dung commanded Steve and his daughter to flee to Indonesia. The hope for a better life pulled their dreams forward out of poverty and persecution. The exodus happened on a pre-arranged seaworthy fishing boat with many other families: hidden inside the hull. If caught they would face stiff prison sentences or drowning in disputed fishing territories of the rough South China Seas. No land was insight as they continued to float over the missing lives of those who did not cross the vast surging border. Forgotten are their names and faces replaced by staggering numbers in the hundreds of thousands became a historical footnote. They will be missed. Great peril surrounded the vessel like a bobber rising and falling on top of the cold and churning waves, but danger also lurked inside of the fishing boat’s hull below the deck. On one occasion, at fourteen years old, Steve was repeatedly kicked by a little girl’s mother. She tried to wrestle away his blanket to keep herself keep warm. She did not prevail. The companionship ended between two families who left Vietnam together. Like the rough China Seas, their betrayal broke apart their relationship like a toppled rogue wave. The conditions quickly deteriorated as the damp and windy weather battered against the fishing boat packed with families hoping for something better beyond. Family members held closely the few belongings they had while in survival mode. They were on high alert for the next confrontation. What was initially thought about the good in other people was incorrect as human nature set the tone. Women who were thought to be proper became combative and sexually loose. The refugees goal upon arriving at Pulau Galang, Indonesia was to make it to the third country: Canada, Australia or the United States of America. The prosperous US was the most desired country of the three. Canada and Australia were easy to get into, but the tough vetting process of the US caused many to see their dream deferred.

Steve and his older sister told the US officials they were politically persecuted as a result of living in Vietnam. For eight months they risked their lives on the island due to their vulnerability as youth without parents and refugees in a foreign country. The oppression and restrictions caused by Vietnam’s communist ideology vanished in the new territory. The newly realized freedoms drove many refugees crazy. Women of high class who would never mix with the poor were found flirting with the fisherman and the camp guards. Soon many women were pregnant. In difficult times the Asian caste system collapsed to human nature. On Pulau Galang, Indonesian natives exploited the Vietnamese refugees by stealing their money. While the water receded between two islands Steve remembers being chased by large groups of natives holding machetes while searching for food. Many refugees were sent back to Vietnam while others who were waiting to be resettled inside the third country organized themselves into gangsters. By hand, the boat people built cement graves for their loved ones above the jungle floor. Hundreds of small boat-like graves are anchored in the moist soil for loved ones who died of tropical diseases like Malaria and Cholera. As the resources dwindled, you see the people for who they really are. The boat ride and the refugee camp shook the Communist prevailing paradigm out of his mind. Reading materials available at the refugee camps taught Steve why Communism was bad. He was taught a lie for fifteen years. Steve realized for the first time he was, “truly an outsider.”